Army close to finding photos were faked

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The British Army investigation into photographs of soldiers torturing an Iraqi prisoner is close to concluding that the pictures were faked by soldiers trying to cash in on rumours of brutality. The Ministry of Defence said the Royal Military Police wanted to question Piers Morgan, editor of the Daily Mirror, which published the photographs, and senior staff.

Members of the Territorial Army, who served with the Queen's Lancashire Regiment in Iraq last year, are also to be questioned about the photographs.

The 1st Battalion of the regiment was reinforced in Basra by up to 100 members of the Territorial Army. The rifle and the truck shown in the pictures are used by the Territorial Army but not by regular units in Iraq.

During the time the regiment was in Iraq there were rumours of Iraqis being abused.

The Ministry of Defence has admitted that 10 military police investigations are under way into claims of brutality, nine involving the army and one the RAF. None of the alleged incidents is said to have occurred in the past seven months.

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Roger Goodwin, an army spokesman, said: "There are strong suspicions in the regiment and elsewhere that the pictures are false." He refused to comment on the investigation into serving members of the regiment.

Desmond Swayne, a senior Conservative MP who has spent time with British troops in Basra, said that Mr Morgan must resign as editor if the photographs were proved to be fakes.

The Mirror said: "Our sources are serving members of the regiment and are standing by their account of what happened and the veracity of the photographs."

Nicholas Soames, the Conservative defence spokesman, and Charles Kennedy, leader of the Liberal Party, urged the Defence Minister to make a statement to MPs about the military police inquiry.

He said that Mr Morgan must have thought "mightily carefully" before publishing the pictures, knowing the inflammatory effect they were bound to have internationally.